This month was hard. Really hard.
For me, it was the most difficult month of the race thus far.
There were many factors that rendered this month so difficult – lots (and lots) of travelling between towns, few ministry opportunities, less than ideal living situations, frustrating people, the list goes on.
But, I knew God had something He wanted to teach me through the difficulties.
At the end of last month I realized that my relationship with God had grown distant. You would think “Oh she’s in another country sharing the love of Jesus so she has to have a great relationship with Him.” That’s what you would think, but it’s not true.
Just like you have to pursue a relationship with Jesus at home, you have to do it on the field too. It doesn’t just come naturally; you have to work for it each and every day.
I had stopped doing that and I didn’t like it, so I began to pray that God would put a desire in my heart for more of His word. I asked Him to make me aware of the things I was putting before Him and to decrease my desire for those things.
And He answered. Before I realized what was happening, I began a study of the book of Ruth.
Ruth is one of my very favorite books in the Bible. Usually when I read Ruth I focus on the story of Ruth and Boaz, but this time I focused on Naomi and I want to share something I learned, with you.
The book of Ruth begins with Naomi, an Israelite widow who has lost everything, including her husband and two sons. She is living in Moab, a land of sin. So Naomi, with nothing left but one of her daughters-in-law Ruth, heads back to Bethlehem. And when she arrives in Bethlehem she tells the women “…the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty.” She has nothing but bitterness, despair, and emptiness.
And Chapter 1 ends saying – “And they came to Bethlehem at the beginning of barley harvest.”
(Disclaimer: Chapters 2 and 3 focus on Ruth and Boaz so I am going to skip over those, but you should go read the whole book because it is SO GOOD!)
So skip over to the end of Chapter 4 and we see a completely different picture of Naomi. In Chapter 1 she was empty-handed, but now she is holding her grandson, the promise from God to redeem her family. And the same women from Chapter 1 are telling Naomi, “Blessed be the Lord, who has not left you this day without a redeemer…” So the book ends and Naomi is full, and happy, and hopeful because her family has been redeemed and God has blessed her abundantly.
When I began reading Ruth I didn’t realize how much it would correlate with this season of my life. This month I was ‘Chapter 1 Naomi.’ I was bitter and empty and in despair.
But what God taught me through Naomi is that He brings His people from bitterness to happiness, from emptiness to fullness, and from despair to hope.
I can’t say that I understand exactly why things went the way they did this month or what all God wants me to learn from it. I can’t say that my ‘Chapter 4’ has come to pass yet.
But sometimes you just have to face reality. And actually, sometimes things just plain suck.
But good things are coming. God will redeem the hard times. He will restore happiness. He will bestow more blessings than we could ever imagine.
Hold on to hope, the harvest is coming.
